Part 36

Perhaps the kingdom of Heaven 's changed! I hope the children there Won't be new-fashioned when I come, And laugh at me, and stare!

I hope the father in the skies Will lift his little girl, -- Old-fashioned, naughty, everything, -- Over the stile of pearl!

XXI.

A TEMPEST.

An awful tempest mashed the air, The clouds were gaunt and few; A black, as of a spectre's cloak, Hid heaven and earth from view.

The creatures chuckled on the roofs And whistled in the air, And shook their fists and gnashed their teeth. And swung their frenzied hair.

The morning lit, the birds arose; The monster's faded eyes Turned slowly to his native coast, And peace was Paradise!

XXII.

THE SEA.

An everywhere of silver, With ropes of sand To keep it from effacing The track called land.

XXIII.

IN THE GARDEN.

A bird came down the walk: He did not know I saw; He bit an angle-worm in halves And ate the fellow, raw.

And then he drank a dew From a convenient grass, And then hopped sidewise to the wall To let a beetle pass.

He glanced with rapid eyes That hurried all abroad, -- They looked like frightened beads, I thought; He stirred his velvet head

Like one in danger; cautious, I offered him a crumb, And he unrolled his feathers And rowed him softer home

Than oars divide the ocean, Too silver for a seam, Or butterflies, off banks of noon, Leap, splashless, as they swim.

XXIV.

THE SNAKE.

A narrow fellow in the grass Occasionally rides; You may have met him, -- did you not, His notice sudden is.

The grass divides as with a comb, A spotted shaft is seen; And then it closes at your feet And opens further on.

He likes a boggy acre, A floor too cool for corn. Yet when a child, and barefoot, I more than once, at morn,

Have passed, I thought, a whip-lash Unbraiding in the sun, -- When, stooping to secure it, It wrinkled, and was gone.

Several of nature's people I know, and they know me; I feel for them a transport Of cordiality;

But never met this fellow, Attended or alone, Without a tighter breathing, And zero at the bone.

XXV.

THE MUSHROOM.

The mushroom is the elf of plants, At evening it is not; At morning in a truffled hut It stops upon a spot